How Soon Is Now?
by GeorgiaFranchot
Summary: Prequel to the sequel of No Other Choice. Draco's POV, he witnesses a death, talks to himself and talks to a Muggle. Oneshot chapter.


_(This is the prequel to the sequel of No Other Choice. It's a secret about the title – Okay, so I haven't thought of one yet, but Ssh! It's a secret anyway, ok? Haha. Okay, this is in Draco's POV and it's the summer before seventh year. This prequel is called How Soon Is Now? It's because I think in some ways this song is pretty much perfect for Draco. Enjoy, and review! I'll have the next coupla chappies up for No Other Choice up in a bit, I promise ya! DSOTM94)_

I didn't want to go.

I had a shyness that you might say was criminally vulgar. I was deliberately avoiding my 'father', by going into a small Muggle town…wearing jeans.

I snorted. Who would've imagined, I, Draco Malfoy would have come to this: Denim jeans and Converse? And a tshirt, obviously. I'm not one of those pretty boys who fancy themselves and go with all the easy girls just to say they've had a shag. No, that's not me.

I'm the one who has all the stupid songs in my head, and wants answers. I privately long for Voldemort to be defeated, dead and gone; of course I do, but thank God for Occlumency. Nobody knows what I'm really thinking, not really. Not ever. They can't, not now, not yet. Not unless Voldemort really does get killed by, well, you know who he is by now. Everyone does, his name is mentioned all over the fucking world, for Christ's sake.

_Where's Hermione_? I wonder.

The sun's hot and the air is stifling. I'm nothing special in particular. Oh, Hermione.

I did actually like her. She dared talk to me, which is a first, considering how badly I'd treated her over the years. Calling her Mudblood. I was taught to treat all half bloods as second class, and the blood traitors and Muggleborns as third class, not even worth looking at. But as I've eventually started to mature and think for myself, I know that's not what I want, even though the black, ugly mark on my left arm says otherwise.

There's going to be a meeting tonight.

A teenage girl with brown hair wanders down my way. She's heading for the park. I'm sitting on a swing looking completely and utterly sad. Friendless. I mean, I've got Blaise, and Luna. I had Hermione. But then that June night changed everything, and she was out of reach, and I'm willing to bet she's going to prance off with those two twats to go and save the world, or something. Or attempt to, anyway.

_Don't think that_. I stare at the ground angrily_. She's going to survive, of course she is. She's the cleverest out of them all._

It began to rain, nice and hard.

The girl was more than a speck now. I half thought it was Hermione, but she's shorter than that, and wears glasses. Fiddling with a Muggle thing. What did Hermione call it- a mobile? Mobile phone? She's talking angrily.

"You shut your mouth!" she shouts.

Memories.

"How can you even _say_ that? You're going entirely the wrong way about this, you fucking dick."

I relish the anger. I'm glad I'm not the only one that's emotionally disturbed. Even if we are worlds apart.

"I'm only human." I hear the tinny whine of a boy. I imagine him blond, and slimy. A bit like the every day me, but Muggle. A pervert.

"The word 'love' is so overused. Just because I…look, it doesn't mean I'm going to shag you, okay! Piss off. You're the same as everyone else. Asking questions, just like everybody else does." She hisses and presses a little button on the 'thing'.

I raise my eyebrows at her. She shakes her head, leaning against the fence. The sky was dripping. "Want to talk about it?" I offer_. Why? Why am I asking her? She looks a little like Hermione and so I talk to her. Forget it, she's out of your life now, forget it, forget it! _I think, irritated.

"Ugh. School. You know what it's like. You do the tiniest thing with a boy at his house, and suddenly everyone knows. It gets twisted and the boy in question has a go at you, and then you get slimy, little boys who certainly don't act their age saying, 'Fancy a shag, sexy?'" she did a horrible impression of the boy.

"What did you do?"

"The first time? I hit him." She grinned.

"No, with the other boy, at the house."

"Oh you _have_ to be _joking_!" she groaned, and glowered at me. I glared back. "What? I only wanted to know. Wouldn't do anything with a Muggle like _you_, anyway." I say the word, unthinkingly.

Her eyes widen. I get concerned as she doesn't go "_Muggle_? What the feck does_ that_ mean?"

I cover up my mistake by asking casually, "How old are you?"

"Just turned sixteen yesterday." The girl says softly.

She's still thinking about my blunder. Shit, what do I _do_? I know what I _want _to do, certainly.

I want to leave on my own, I want to go home, because the girl looks like she's going to cry, and I want to die.

"Muggle." She says calmly.

I blink slowly, and stare at the rough, uneven ground.

"Right…is this one of those weird boy jokes that girls don't get?"

Phew.

"You could say that, yeah." I grin back.

I look at the clock. It's seven.

It's really raining now, even though it's August, the 26th, I think. "Want to come over to my house? I mean, not to do anything, just to keep out of the rain." She suggests.

I nod. "I've got a while to wait."

It's a short walk across a road, round a corner, up a path and we're in her bedroom, and I imagine Hermione.

I noticed she had a series of books, there were six of them. Before I could take a proper look at the titles, she was tapping away on some red thing that opened up and had a million buttons…or thereabouts.

She saw me looking and grinned. "Got it last year. A Dell Inspiron, pretty good, don't you think?"

I could only nod as the screen flashed and all sorts came popping up.

"I'm sorry; I haven't even asked you your name." I spoke to break the silence.

"Oh, it's Hannah. What about you?" she asked.

"Tom." I say, thinking of a common name.

"It's funny, you know Edward Cullen? You remind me of him a bit, only not so vampire."

Ah now I did recognise that. The red ribbon on the book…I rolled my eyes at her. "Oh, typical girl. What's that?" I asked, as if I knew what I was talking about, when actually I had no idea what the purple thing with a white lead was in her hands.

"What, what I'm listening to? It's…a song." She said shortly. I could hear words leaking out of the lead.

"When I wanted to cry, I couldn't 'cause I wasn't allowed…"

"Gomenasai." I said, startling myself as well as Hannah.

"You know t.A.T.u?"

"Not personally." I say deliberately, and she rolls her eyes. So like Hermione. "I stopped myself!" she sings. Or attempts to. Just like Hermione.

"Didn't expect a boy to know about them."

"Yeah, well, there's this girl I knew at school who's obsessed with them."

"Knew?" she catches it.

_I walked away…_

Oh God, make it go away. Make it go away now! I seized the iPod and shook it a little, and magically, it goes onto another song. I would later find out it was something that was called Shuffle. I think.

"Well, I've not seen her for a while, you know." I shrug. Like I don't even care. Hannah nods and listens to the song, closing her eyes.

"See the world…" I mouth the words to myself, pretending to look out of the window, burning my legs against the heating device attached to the wall. This music was freaking me out now.

_No big secret left unspoken_.

_It's never getting warmer._

_All the lies we kept on selling. Nobody checked the spelling._

_Paragliding, back to heaven._

I can't take it anymore and say, "Oh shit, I've got to go."

She looks concerned. "Are you alright?"

"I'll live." I grimace, checking for my wand in my back pocket, and maybe it's just me, but her eyes flicker to the pocket I check. _Maybe she's checking I'm not a Muggle drug dealer_. I think, but it's just for peace of mind. Nobody saw the wand anyway. Of course she didn't.

**The Truth:**

**Hannah had seen, alright. When Draco left, she stepped over to her bookshelf and slid out a particular book. With thirty chapters, and six hundred and seven pages, Ya Soshla S Uma played quietly in the background as she read the book more meticulously than she ever had done before.**

_**A oni govoryuat, vinovata sama…**_

I was hurrying through the rain, and remembered the Apparition technique. Turning on the spot, I arrived back 'home'.

"Draco, you are later than we expected." My hoarse, pale father uttered, dark rings around his eyes from Azkaban. His blond hair is in a stringy mess, but it's my mother who speaks next, shivering at the draught blowing in.

"Shut the door Draco, please. There's a meeting tonight, if you'd like to go." She said softly.

"He's already going!" my father snarled. "We have to get him ready."

My mother closed her eyes and tried to breathe calmly.

Since I had failed in my…mission (Yes, we'll just skip over the finer details of that, thank you so very much) then I had expected to be murdered myself, but amazingly, I had lived…just about.

"You know, I really do love you." She whispered, standing away from the man I used to call dad.

It was dark when everyone began to arrive. I kept my eyes away from the pale, hairless, snake creature.

"Ah…Draco." The creature said as softly as my mother, but not as tenderly. It was like the spitting fire. I bowed my head slowly.

"We have a guest." The voice found it's way into my ear, although he was speaking to the adults.

A body floating up above a table, as I sat near my mother, the only family I could sort of trust now. I couldn't help but look up every few seconds. I'd seen her at Hogwarts…I keep my mouth shut and head down until..

"Yaxley. Snape. You are very nearly late." The voice rang through the hall and I allowed my eyes to slide to Snape, who sat next to the 'Dark Lord'. I hated referring to him like that, when I had to.

Most of the eyes around the table followed Snape, and it was to him that Voldemort spoke first. _Why give yourself a new name_? I thought. I only ever got through the meetings by having a conversation with myself in my head. Once again, thank fuck for Occlumency,  
"So?"  
"My Lord, the Order of the Phoenix intends to move Harry Potter from his current place of safety on Saturday next, at nightfall."

Oh, brilliant.  
The interest around the table sharpened palpably: Some stiffened, others fidgeted, all gazing at Snape and Voldemort. Except me. I stared resolutely at the fire, unblinkingly, although it hurt my eyes. It was like the specks of Hermione's eyes, when she was angry. Usually at me.

"Saturday ... at nightfall," repeated Voldemort. His red eyes fastened upon Snape's black ones with such intensity that some of the watchers looked away, apparently fearful that they themselves would be scorched by the ferocity of the gaze. I wouldn't be surprised. Snape, however, looked calmly back intoVoldemort's face and, after a moment or two, Voldemort's lipless mouth curved into something like a smile.  
"Good. Very good. And this information comes -"  
" - from the source we discussed," said Snape. Oh yes, that source.  
"My Lord."

Yaxley had leaned forward to look down the long table at Voldemort and Snape. All faces turned to him. _Can't we just get this over with?_ I screamed internally_. Let's just make plans and then just fuck off back to wherever we live? Which is not here for the majority of you! Sod off, you thoughtless wankers, you stupid, buggery twats! What about Hermione?_  
"My Lord, I have heard differently."  
Yaxley waited, but Voldemort did not speak, so he went on, "Dawlish, the Auror, let slip that Potter will not be moved until the thirtieth, the night before the boy turns seventeen."

_I. Do. Not. Care. But hang on…would Granger be involved in that? That's likely, he's one of her best mates._ I decided.  
Snape was smiling.  
"My source told me that there are plans to lay a false trail; this must be it. No doubt a Confundus Charm has been placed upon Dawlish. It would not be the first time; he is known to be susceptible."  
"I assure you, my Lord, Dawlish seemed quite certain," said Yaxley.  
"If he has been Confunded, naturally he is certain," said Snape. "I assure you, Yaxley, the Auror Office will play no further part in the protection of Harry Potter. The Order believes that we have infiltrated the Ministry."

"The Order's got one thing right, then, eh?" said a squat man sitting a short distance from Yaxley; he gave a wheezy giggle that was echoed here and there along the table.  
Voldemort did not laugh. His gaze had wandered upward to the body revolving slowly overhead, and he seemed to be lost in thought.  
"My Lord," Yaxley went on, "Dawlish believes an entire party of Aurors will be used to transfer the boy -"  
Voldemort held up a large white hand, and Yaxley subsided at once, watching resentfully as Voldemort turned back to Snape.  
"Where are they going to hide the boy next?"

"At the home of one of the Order," said Snape. "The place, according to the source, has been given every protection that the Order and Ministry together could provide. I think that there is little chance of taking him once he is there, my Lord , unless, of course, the Ministry has fallen before next Saturday, which might give us the opportunity to discover and undo enough of the enchantments to break through the rest."

_And I can bet that Hermione will be there, too. Weasley's house? _I ponder._ She could get herself killed trying to save one of those fuckers._

I just felt so angry, all the time.

"Well, Yaxley?" Voldemort called down the table, the firelight glinting strangely in his red eyes. "Will the Ministry have fallen by next Saturday?"  
Once again, all heads turned. Yaxley squared his shoulders.  
"My Lord, I have good news on that score. I have - with difficulty, and after great effort - succeeded in placing an Imperius Curse upon Pius Thicknesse."  
Many of those sitting around Yaxley looked impressed; his neighbour, Dolohov, a man with a long, twisted face, clapped him on the back.  
"It is a start," said Voldemort. "But Thicknesse is only one man. Scrimgeour must be surrounded by our people before I act. One failed attempt on the Minister's life will set me back a long way."  
"Yes - my Lord, that is true - but you know, as Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Thicknesse has regular contact not only with the Minister himself, but also with the Heads of all the other Ministry departments. It will, I think, be easy now that we have such a high-ranking official under our control, to subjugate the others, and then they can all work together to bring Scrimgeour down."

I longed to be back in the Room, loving Hermione, or just bantering in the common room, with her, Blaise and Luna.

I only survive by writing to Blaise, when I can. It keeps me sane.

How did it go again? Ya Soshla S Uma…I have lost my mind.

_Just don't talk to me…don't talk to me…_yours truly prayed.

"As long as our friend Thicknesse is not discovered before he has converted the rest," said Voldemort. "At any rate, it remains unlikely that the Ministry will be mine before next Saturday. If we cannot touch the boy at his destination, then it must be done while he travels."

So…so that's it. We're going to try and kill Potter.

"We are at an advantage there, my Lord," said Yaxley, who seemed determined to receive some portion of approval. "We now have several people planted within the Department of Magical Transport. If Potter Apparates or uses the Floo Network, we shall know immediately."

Great.

"He will not do either," said Snape. "The Order is eschewing any form of transport that is controlled or regulated by the Ministry; they mistrust everything to do with the place."  
"All the better," said Voldemort. "He will have to move in the open. Easier to take, by far."  
Again, Voldemort looked up at the slowly revolving body (I shuddered slightly) as he went on, "I shall attend to the boy in person. There have been too many mistakes where Harry Potter is concerned. Some of them have been my own. That Potter lives is due more to my errors than to his triumphs."

The company around the table watched Voldemort apprehensively, each of them, by his or her expression, afraid that they might be blamed for Harry Potter's continued existence. Including me, sadly. I longed to be as fearless as Severus, but I couldn't quite carry it off. Voldemort, however, seemed to be speaking more to himself than to any of us, still addressing the unconscious body above him.

"I have been careless, and so have been thwarted by luck and chance, those wreckers of all but the best-laid plans. But I know better now. I understand those things that I did not understand before. I must be the one to kill Harry Potter, and I shall be."

Charming. Utterly, utterly charming. _I don't want to be here, I don't want to be here!_

At these words, seemingly in response to them, a sudden wail sounded, a terrible, drawn-out cry of misery and pain. Many of us at the table looked downward, startled, for the sound had seemed to issue from below our feet.  
"Wormtail," said Voldemort, with no change in his quiet, thoughtful tone, and without removing his eyes from the revolving body above, "have I not spoken to you about keeping our prisoner quiet?"

"Yes, m-my Lord," gasped a small man halfway down the table, who had been sitting so low in his chair that it appeared, at first glance, to be unoccupied. Now he scrambled from his seat and scurried from the room, leaving nothing behind him but a curious gleam of silver.  
"As I was saying," continued Voldemort, looking again at the tense faces of his followers, "I understand better now. I shall need, for instance, to borrow a wand from one of you before I go to kill Potter."  
The faces around him displayed nothing but shock; he might have announced that he wanted to borrow one of their arms.  
"No volunteers?" said Voldemort. "Let's see ... Lucius, I see no reason for you to have a wand anymore."  
Father looked up. His skin appeared yellowish and waxy in the firelight, and his eyes were sunken and shadowed. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse.

"My Lord?"  
"Your wand, Lucius. I require your wand."  
"I ..."  
He glanced sideways at mum. She was staring straight ahead, quite as pale as he was, her long blonde hair hanging down her back, but beneath the table her slim fingers closed briefly on his wrist. The other hand was enclosed in mine. Sentimental? It was one of the things that kept me going. At her touch, 'father' put his hand into his robes, withdrew a wand, and passed it along to Voldemort, who held it up in front of his red eyes, examining it closely.  
"What is it?"  
"Elm, my Lord," whispered he.  
"And the core?"  
"Dragon - dragon heartstring."

"Good," said Voldemort. He drew out his wand and compared the lengths. Father did something stupid; for a fraction of a second, it seemed he expected to receive Voldemort's wand in exchange for his own. The gesture was not missed by Voldemort, whose eyes widened maliciously.

"Give you my wand, Lucius? My wand?"  
Some of the throng sniggered. I closed my eyes and stared at the table. I opened them again, for fear of being noticed.

"I have given you your liberty, Lucius, is that not enough for you? But I have noticed that you and your family seem less than happy of late ... What is it about my presence in your home that displaces you, Lucius?"  
"Nothing - nothing, my Lord!"  
"Such _lies_ Lucius ... "  
The soft voice seemed to hiss on even after the cruel mouth had stopped moving. One or two barely repressed a shudder as the hissing grew louder; something heavy could be heard sliding across the floor beneath the table.

_Oh great, now I bet it's me that gets murdered_. I wanted to curl up in a corner and cry and die.

The huge snake emerged to climb slowly up Voldemort's chair. It rose, seemingly endlessly, and came to rest across Voldemort's shoulders: its eyes, with their vertical slits for pupils, unblinking. Voldemort stroked the creature absently with long thin fingers, still looking at father.

"Why do the Malfoys look so unhappy with their lot? Is my return, my rise to power, not the very thing they professed to desire for so many years?"

_NO! NO IT IS NOT_! I longed to shout, but that was as effective as digging my own grave. My chest hurt, it tightened.

"Of course, my Lord," said the man who helped create me. His hand shook as he wiped sweat from his upper lip. "We did desire it - we do."

Mum made an odd, stiff nod, her eyes averted from Voldemort and the snake. To his right, I, who had been gazing up at the inert body overhead, glanced quickly at Voldemort and away again, terrified to make eye contact. I didn't dare.

"My Lord," said a dark woman halfway down the table, her voice constricted with emotion, "it is an honour to have you here, in our family's house. There can be no higher pleasure."

Oh yes. Aunt Bellatrix.

She sat beside her sister, as unlike her in looks, with her dark hair and heavily lidded eyes, as she was in bearing and demeanour; where Narcissa sat rigid and impassive, Bellatrix leaned toward Voldemort, for mere words could not demonstrate her longing for closeness. I had a suspicion they…well, I didn't want to know. Voldemort didn't love people. But you don't need to love someone to…no, it couldn't be possible. I didn't want it to be.

"No higher pleasure," repeated Voldemort, his head tilted a little to one side as he considered Bellatrix. "That means a great deal, Bellatrix, from you."  
Her face flooded with colour; her eyes welled with tears of delight.  
"My Lord knows I speak nothing but the truth!"  
"No higher pleasure ... even compared with the happy event that, I hear, has taken place in your family this week?"

She stared at him, her lips parted, evidently confused.  
"I don't know what you mean, my Lord."  
"I'm talking about your niece, Bellatrix. And yours, Lucius and Narcissa. She has just married the werewolf, Remus Lupin. You must be so proud."  
There was an eruption of jeering laughter from around the table. Many leaned forward to exchange gleeful looks; a few thumped the table with their fists. The giant snake, disliking the disturbance, opened its mouth wide and hissed angrily, but the Death Eaters did not hear it, so jubilant were they at Bellatrix and the Malfoys' humiliation.

I knew something was going to happen soon.

Bellatrix's face, so recently flushed wit happiness, had turned an ugly, blotchy red.  
"She is no niece of ours, my Lord," she cried over the outpouring of mirth. "We - Narcissa and I - have never set eyes on our sister since she married the Mudblood. This brat has nothing to do with either of us, nor any beast she marries."  
"What say you, Draco?" asked Voldemort, and though his voice was quiet, it carried clearly through the catcalls and jeers. "Will you babysit the cubs?"

The hilarity mounted; I turned to look at my father who had brought this on me, who was staring down into his own lap, then caught mum's eye. Pleadingly. She shook her head almost imperceptibly, then resumed her own deadpan stare at the opposite wall.  
"Enough," said Voldemort, stroking the angry snake. "Enough."  
And the laughter died at once.

"Many of our oldest family trees become a little diseased over time," he said as Bellatrix gazed at him, breathless and imploring, "You must prune yours, must you not, to keep it healthy? Cut away those parts that threaten the health of the rest."  
"Yes, my Lord," whispered Bellatrix, and her eyes swam with tears of gratitude again. "At the first chance!"  
"You shall have it," said Voldemort. "And in your family, so in the world ... we shall cut away the canker that infects us until only those of the true blood remain ..."  
Voldemort raised father's wand, pointed it directly at the slowly revolving figure suspended over the table, and gave it a tiny flick. The figure came to life with a groan and began to struggle against invisible bonds.

"Do you recognize our guest, Severus?" asked Voldemort.  
Snape raised his eyes to the upside down face. All of the Death Eaters were looking up at the captive now, as though they had been given permission to show curiosity. As she revolved to face the firelight, the woman said in a cracked and terrified voice, "Severus! Help me!"  
"Ah, yes," said Snape as the prisoner turned slowly away again.  
"And you, Draco?" asked Voldemort, stroking the snake's snout with his wand-free hand. I shook my head jerkily. Now that the woman had woken, I seemed unable to look at her anymore. Even though I didn't get taught by her, I had seen her…

"But you would not have taken her classes," said Voldemort. "For those of you who do not know, we are joined here tonight by Charity Burbage who, until recently, taught at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

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There were small noises of comprehension around the table. A broad, hunched woman with pointed teeth cackled.  
"Yes ... Professor Burbage taught the children of witches and wizards all about Muggles ... how they are not so different from us ... "  
One of the Death Eaters spat on the floor. Charity Burbage revolved to face Snape again.

"Severus ... please ... please ... "  
"Silence," said Voldemort, with another twitch of his wand, and Charity fell silent as if gagged. "Not content with corrupting and polluting the minds of Wizarding children, last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defence of Mudbloods in the Daily Prophet. Wizards, she says, must accept these thieves of their knowledge and magic. The dwindling of the purebloods is, says Professor Burbage, a most desirable circumstance ... She would have us all mate with Muggles ... or, no doubt, werewolves ... "

I wanted to help her, honestly, I did. But even as I moved in my seat to face my mother, father gave me a dangerous look that made me freeze.

Nobody laughed this time. There was no mistaking the anger and contempt in Voldemort's voice. For the third time, Charity Burbage revolved to face Snape. Tears were pouring from her eyes into her hair. Snape looked back at her, quite impassive, as she turned slowly away from him again.  
"Avada Kedavra!"  
The flash of green light illuminated every corner of the room. Charity fell, with a resounding crash, onto the table below, which trembled and creaked. Several of the Death Eaters leapt back in their chairs. Draco fell out of his onto the floor.  
"Dinner, Nagini," said Voldemort softly, and the great snake swayed and slithered from his shoulders onto the polished wood.

I felt sick.

"Now Draco." Voldemort said softly.

I slowly looked up at him. "You will be returning to Hogwarts in September, but I may call you if I need any assistance with anything, and you are to arrive without fail, is that understood?"

"Yes, my Lord." I said strongly, not meaning a bit of it.

I wasn't going to kill anyone, not even if they were brought specially. That was one thing I was never going to do.

Not even if it mean I died myself.

_To be continued….  
_

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